If It’s Saturday, This Must Be The Queen Mary 2 (still…)

As I sit here writing this, I feel like I must apologize for the glacial pace at which this blog seems to be moving so far. I promise that once I get to Paris it will pick up speed, but until then, I’m trying to get in as much R&R as possible. Rest assured though, I’ll be going at a dead sprint for the rest of journey so I’ll have plenty of stories to keep you entertained for the next seven weeks.

Anyhow, it happens to be 11:30 PM in this part of the Atlantic and I’m up late having a near-midnight snack at the King’s Court (see sad state of affairs below). I can’t really sleep since my 80 minute facial, manicure and 45 minutes in the sauna put me into a minor coma when I got back to my stateroom early this afternoon. I did get my second wind after a room service dinner, so here I am writing to you all.

Yesterday was slightly more eventful. I even hit the gym for about an hour and a half before lunch. And if you think running on the treadmill is challenging on dry land, then you’ve never tried to do it while afloat in the middle of the choppy Atlantic Ocean. Keeping balance required more coordination than I have on my best days, so I resorted to holding onto the handles and tried to make it seem I was doing some sort of interval training. On a lighter note, I found out that Lily Allen’s albums make an excellent workout playlist. She’s the perfect juxtaposition of British pop music and shameless, entertaining, pseudo-feminist stand-up. It almost made forget that I looked ridiculous jogging and holding on to a handle for dear life… almost.

Per usual, dinner with my Britannia crew included great conversation and delicious food, but the rib-eye steak I ordered was bigger than my hand. It was so big that I actually acted very “touristy” and took a picture of it so you could see that I’m not exaggerating. It looks like what Lawry’s gives all the football players going to the Rose Bowl, right?

After eating half a cow last night, I thought I would start the day off right with some fruit for breakfast and a cleansing spa experience. I booked the first facial appointment at 9:00 AM followed by a manicure at the Canyon Ranch SpaClub. Since I’m too ticklish to get a full body massage, facials and mani/pedis are the closest thing. And my Vitamin Infusion Facial with Tamara and Spa Manicure with Bongi did not disappoint. After that, I hit the sauna since Tamara told me it would enhance my facial. She was absolutely right. I came out of there with dewy, supple skin, but I felt like mush. I got back to my room, drank a 1.5 L bottle of water and conked out until around 3:30 PM, just in time for afternoon tea.

After my nap and tea, I realized what a lovely day it was, and once again ventured out onto the ship. Lounged on the Deck 7 chaises with my Kindle in tow. I tried to read, but the ocean was distracting. I couldn’t look away. The water in the middle of the Atlantic is not like any I’ve ever seen. The Pacific at Zuma or Will Rogers Beaches is a green that makes you think of all the pollutants that are floating around, and the Hawaiian beaches offer that glass-like quality that allows you to see all the way to the ocean floor, but the this ocean wavers between a cerulean and a deep sapphire (which is my birthstone, so maybe that’s why I’m so taken with it).

After about an hour of attempting to read while mindlessly staring at the ocean, I made my way into the library. I didn’t realize that it was at the bow of the ship until then, and from where I was sitting I could see how the ocean tossed the QM2 around like a toy in a bathtub.

I finally made it back to my room, but I was still feeling a little slow from my sauna experience, so I ordered dinner in. After a couple more hours of reading on my balcony, I got the munchies and made my way down to the King’s Court for that snack I just finished. Relaxing end to a relaxing day 🙂